Benjamin Disraeli's tenure as prime minister of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland began when Queen Victoria first invited him to form a government in 1864. He was then the Conservative prime minister on two occasions, first in 1868 and then between 1874 and 1880.

First government (1868)

In February 1868 the Prime Minister, The Earl of Derby, received medical advice which told him that he could not fully recover from his illness whilst Premier. He therefore asked Benjamin Disraeli (who was Chancellor of the Exchequer at the time) if he was ready to be Premier. Disraeli said yes, telling his friends, "I have climbed to the top of the greasy pole".Robert Blake, Disraeli (1966), pp. 485–87. However his political position was weak—a caretaker in the minority.

Disraeli inherited a minority Conservative administration but was able to pass some notable Acts of Parliament. The Public Schools Act 1868 established a board of governors for nine English public schools. The Telegraph Act 1868 gave the Post Office power to nationalise all telegraph companies. The Capital Punishment Amendment Act 1868 abolished public executions. Disraeli also appointed a Royal Commission on the Sanitary Laws chaired by Sir Charles Adderley. Blake, Disraeli (1966), p. 495.

The Parliamentary Elections Act 1868 transferred the power to try to punish electoral irregularities from the partisan Committee of the House of Commons to the impartial tribunal of judges. The judges objected to these new responsibilities imposed on them but their opposition was overcome and electoral irregularities were then tried in a legal tribunal rather than a committee of party politicians.William Flavelle Monypenny and George Earle Buckle, The Life of Benjamin Disraeli, Earl of Beaconsfield. Volume II. 1860–1881 (London: John Murray, 1929), p. 382.

The main domestic issue was the status of the Anglican Church in Ireland, where it was officially established although enrolling a small minority. It became the main election issue as well.Blake, Disraeli (1966), p. 496.

Foreign policy

On 26 April news came of the result of Sir Robert Napier's expedition to Abyssinia. Napier had defeated the forces of Theodore II of Abyssinia and released the British prisoners: the British envoy and the British consul.Monypenny and Buckle, p. 383. In moving a motion in Parliament thanking Napier and his forces, Disraeli paid to tribute to Napier, who led his army with "the elephants of Asia, bearing the artillery of Europe, over African passes which might have startled the trapper and appalled the hunter of the Alps". He went on to say that Napier's troops "had to scale a mountain fortress, of which the intrinsic strength was such that it may be fairly said it would have been impregnable to the whole world had it been defended by the man by whom it was assailed". Disraeli famously said that "the standard of St. George was hoisted on the mountains of Rasselas".Monypenny and Buckle, p. 384.

The cost of the expedition was originally estimated by Disraeli's Chancellor of the Exchequer, George Ward Hunt, to be £5m, raising the income tax from four pence to six pence to fund it. However, in 1869 the Liberal Chancellor had to meet a total of £9m. However Disraeli still defended the expedition, writing to a friend in 1875: "I do not look back to the Abyssinian [war] with regret: quite the reverse. It was a noble feat of arms, and highly raised our prestige in the East...Money is not to be considered in such matters: success alone is to be thought of".Monypenny and Buckle, p. 385.

Second government (1874–1880)

The beginning of Disraeli's second premiership coincided with a growing demand for the Ritualistic controversy in the Church of England to be settled by legislation. The Public Worship Regulation Bill passed its first and second readings without a division in the House of Lords and, with amendment, passed its third reading without division.Monypenny and Buckle, pp. 653-63. After Gladstone came out against the Bill, Disraeli came out for it, accusing Gladstone of challenging the whole Reformation settlement.Monypenny and Buckle, p. 664. Disraeli urged the Bill to be passed in order "to put down Ritualism" and that he was prepared to respect Roman Catholicism practised by Roman Catholics but that he objected to the "Mass in masquerade".Monypenny and Buckle, p. 665. The second reading in the House of Commons was passed without division and most clauses of the Bill passed with massive majorities. However the Bill nearly failed to become law when there was a major dispute over the clause which the Archbishops in the Lords had given the Bill: that Bishops should have a veto to prevent "frivolous and irresponsible prosecutions of devoted clergyman". There was in the Commons inserted a clause which gave the right to appeal against this veto to the Archbishop of the Province, which passed with a majority of 23. The High Church party took up the right of a Bishop to uncontrolled rule in his diocese and the Lords dropped their insistence on the appeal to the Archbishop of the Province. Disraeli was worried that the Commons would not pass the Bill without the Archbishop's veto but he managed to persuade the Commons to pass it without the clause by appealing to the need to put down a "small but pernicious sect".Monypenny and Buckle, pp. 665–7.

Disraeli and the Queen were close, and she wanted an imperial title (her daughter had one in Germany). The Royal Titles Bill, added the title Empress of India to the British monarch's official title. Despite Liberal opposition it passed into law with the assurance that the monarch would only use the Indian title externally; within the United Kingdom the monarch would still be King or Queen rather than Emperor or Empress in ordinary and official usage except when using the "I" after "R" in signature, "Emperor of India" in public proclamations and "Ind. Imp." on the coinage.Monypenny and Buckle, p. 811. Disraeli wanted the measure passed to let the world know that Britain would hold onto India: "It is only by the amplification of titles that you can often touch and satisfy the imagination of nations; and that is an element which Governments must not despise".Monypenny and Buckle, p. 805.

Social reform The Disraeli government's programme of social reform began in the second session of Parliament, 1874–75. This government, chiefly under the influence of the Home Secretary Richard Cross and with the encouragement of Disraeli, addressed "the condition of the people" through major reforms in three areas: housing, savings and labour relations.Monypenny and Buckle, pp. 703–4. Disraeli's watchword was "Sanitas sanitatum, omnia sanitas", which the Liberals decried as "a policy of sewage". Disraeli responded that sanitary reform included "most of the civilising influences of humanity".Monypenny and Buckle, pp. 702-3.

The housing of the working classes was dealt with by the Artisans' and Labourers' Dwellings Improvement Act 1875 which for the first time gave local councils in large towns power to destroy slum buildings for sanitary reasons and replace them with new ones for artisans. Councils would compensate previous owners for this expropriation and when six years later it was seen that claims for compensation were impeding councils from embarking on housing reform an Amending Act was passed which provided that if overcrowding had created a nuisance, compensation should be given only at the value of the house after the nuisance had been remedied, so that "grasping and callous owners should not profit by their misdeeds".Monypenny and Buckle, p. 704. However the Act was criticised by the Radicals who believed in laissez-faire: Henry Fawcett MP scoffed at the Act and asked why Parliament should secure working-class housing and not that of dukes.

The savings of the working classes were secured with the passing of the Friendly Societies Act 1875 (38 & 39 Vict. c. 60). This act allowed friendly societies considerable self-management "but insured the adoption of sound rules, effective audit, and rates of payment sufficient to maintain solvency. It established the friendly societies, and with them the people's savings on a satisfactory basis".Monypenny and Buckle, pp. 704–5.

Disraeli's government also passed two Acts which dealt with labour relations: the Employers and Workmen Act 1875 and the Conspiracy and Protection of Property Act 1875 (38 & 39 Vict. c. 86). Previously, a breach of contract by a worker was punished as a criminal act whilst an employer who breached a contract was only liable in a civil court. The Employers and Workmen Act made breaches of contract by a worker a civil offence and therefore made workers and employers equal before the law regarding labour contracts.Monypenny and Buckle, p. 705. The Conspiracy and Protection of Property Act amended the law of conspiracy in favour of trade unions and legalised peaceful picketing.Blake, p. 555. Disraeli wrote to a friend that these acts "will gain and retain for the Conservatives the lasting affection of the working classes". The Trade Union Manual of Labour Laws called these two acts "the charter of the social and industrial freedom of the working classes" and in autumn 1875 the Labour Congress and one of the few labour members of Parliament, Alexander Macdonald, formally thanked the government for passing these measures. Macdonald told his constituents in 1879: "The Conservative party have done more for the working classes in five years than the Liberals have in fifty".Monypenny and Buckle, p. 709.

The Public Health Act 1875 (38 & 39 Vict. c. 55) consolidated previous measures of public health and the Factory and Workshop Act 1878 consolidated all previous Factory Acts, of which the veteran campaigner for Factory Acts, Lord Shaftesbury, spoke strongly in favour of in the House of Lords.Monypenny and Buckle, p. 706. Disraeli's government had previously passed the Factory Act 1874 (37 & 38 Vict. c. 44) which reduced the working day for women and children to ten hours on a weekday and six hours on a Saturday. This was opposed by those Radicals such as Fawcett and 79 Liberals voted against it. The Rivers Pollution Prevention Act 1876 (39 & 40 Vict. c. 75) outlawed the flow of solid matter into rivers and compelled manufacturers to make sure the liquid flowing from their factories into rivers was harmless. This was again opposed by the Radicals such as Sir Charles Dilke.Monypenny and Buckle, p. 707.

Foreign policy Disraeli and his foreign minister Lord Derby scored a number of achievements. In 1875 came the purchase of the controlling shares in the Suez Canal company. By negotiations, Russia gave up substantial gains in the Balkans and a foothold in the Mediterranean. Britain gains control of Cyprus from the Ottomans as a naval base covering the Eastern Mediterranean. In exchange, Britain guaranteed the Asiatic territories of the Ottoman Empire. Britain did not do well in conflicts in Afghanistan and South Africa.R. C. K. Ensor, England, 1870–1914 (1936), pp 37-65. online

Suez Canal